Welcome to the Circus!

It's no secret. I love to plan parties and I love to add my own little touch to making things a little more fun. Autumn turned 8 on March 9th and she wanted to have a Circus birthday party. I had a lot of fun planning this. There are a lot of things that can be done for a circus party.

As always, I look for something to help inspire my direction for each party. This time around, I found some cute polka dot wrapping paper from Target. It had all the bright colors that are seen at a circus - Red, Yellow, Blue, Teal Blue, Orange, and Green. I especially liked the addition of the teal blue because that is Autumn's favorite color of blue!

Next, it was time to create the invitations. Instead of going through my stash of scrapbooking paper, I decided to use the wrapping paper. After all, that was the inspiration behind it all. I wanted the invitation to have a little bit of a BIG TOP circus feel, so I printed off some red and white striped paper. I used this at the top and rounded it off ~ again the BIG TOP feel. To seal it, I made a little decal that read "COME ONE, COME ALL." Inside the invite read "Nelson Entertainment Proudly Presents: AUTUMNS BIRTHDAY CIRCUS; Come to the Greatest Show on Earth! It Will Be Fun for All: TREATS~GAMES~CLOWNS; Appearing One Day Only: March 12th; Show Time: 1:00 P.M. to 3:00 P.M.; Join Us Under the Big Top at: (Address Listed); Don't Clown Around ~ RSVP to the Ringmaster at (Phone Number Listed)." I made sure to download some free Circus Fonts that helped add the the Circus feel. They turned out cute!

Once the invites were made and sent out, it was time to work on the decorations and party details. I decided that it would be fun to turn the kids into clowns and they can perform in their own circus! So, when I was out at the Dollar Tree I found some red and orange cheerleading poms which lead to my bright idea for using those as clown hair. I figured I could make my own party hats and attach the pom on the inside of the hat to create the clown hair. And to add a personal touch, I put each kids name on their hat. I purchased a foam star sticker pack that I would divided up for each kid to use to decorate their clown hat. (You know, some thing to help pass the party time). I ordered clown noses off of Amazon for way cheap. A clown isn't a clown without the nose, right? Another part of becoming a clown, I wanted to make bow ties. Originally I was going to make them from ribbons, but that would've become super expensive! Then I had an idea of creating a bow tie out of tissue paper that I already had! And last, but not least, I purchased some face paint to paint on some simple lips and eye brows to add to the effect of turning them into clowns.

(The white bow ties were for practice. I wanted to make sure it would work before I created all the real bowties.)

Next the decor.

1. I made a welcome banner for the front door that read "WELCOME TO THE CIRCUS~FEATURING THE AMAZING~AUTUMN."
   
2. Inside, I decorated the table with a bright red table cloth and bright blue plates. On top of each kids plate I had a clown hat, bow tie, clown nose, and stickers to decorate.
   
3. Above the main table, I created our own little BIG TOP with red and white crepe paper.
   
4. I created a sign designating a CONCESSION STAND area that hung from the island counter. At the concession stand, I created signs for each of the snacks that the kids could help themselves to. It had all sorts of fun circus goodies: Self-serve Pink Lemonade, Popcorn, Carmel Popcorn, Peanuts, Frosted Circus Cookies, Licorice, Cotton Candy and 3 bowls of colorful Candy to choose from.
   
5. Since I was going to be face painting the kids faces, I created a sign for the "FACE PAINTING" area.
   
6. And I thought it would be fun to have a picture of each of the kids after they were turned into a clown. So with the polka dot wrapping paper I created a designated "PHOTO BOOTH" area where each kid could have their picture taken.
7. For the cake, Autumn wanted a Coldstone cake - Mmm Mmm Chip. Since this wasn't going to have a circus feel, I purchased some bright colored balloon candles.
8. And for the final touch, what's a party without a gift bag for each of the kids to take home? So, I created a sign saying "GIFT BAGS" and hung it from the entry table where I had all the gift bags lined up. Each gift bag was a paper, red and white, popcorn bag. Each was filled with bright colored goodies such as bubbles, play dough, start stickers, whistles, flavored tootsie rolls, and pixie sticks.

Now for the party plans! Autumn's party itinerary included the following:

• 1:00 PM - 1:20 PM - Party Guests Arrive. This time was designated for decorating clown hats, have their faces get painted, and help themselves to the circus snacks at the CONCESSION STAND
• 1:20 PM - 2:20 PM - Game Time. This included a Trick & Lion Roaring Contest, Monkey See-Monkey Do (Simon Says), Circus Charades, Balloon Blowing Contest, Balloon Squish, and Walk the Tight (tape) Rope.
• 2:20 PM - 2:30 PM - Birthday Cake. Sing Happy Birthday, eat some ice cream, and have more circus snacks.
• 2:30 PM - 2:50 PM - Open Presents.
• 2:50 PM - 3:00 PM - End of Party Fun. Give away gift bags and play more of the circus games.

The party was a blast! I had a lot of fun with this one. Autumn loved every bit of it ~ which makes all of it COMPLETELY worth it!

Happy Birthday Autumn!